The essays are extremely uneven, both in terms of their ability to deliver on the editors' vision and in their overall quality. The highlight of this nevertheless worthwhile volume is the synthesis in the first chapter by Steve Rathgeb Smith. He does an admirable job of weaving a comprehensive literature review on the evolution of scholarly thought about the origins and roles of nonprofits into the more specific concerns of the articles in this volume. His contribution deftly identifies the lacunae in existing theory, which tends to overemphasize the role nonprofits can play in enhancing social welfare, and points to more explicitly politically significant functions that nonprofits are fulfilling in urban areas. He seeks to show how the other contributions to this volume exemplify various aspects of this more political purpose for nonprofits.

Although generally trenchant, Smith's essay creats something of a straw man argument that is repeated several times throughout the book. Smith maintains that Lester Salamon's oft-cited “partnership” theory of nonprofit organizations cannot account for the emergence of more politically motivated nonprofits. Yet, few readers will be surprised to learn that some nonprofits may frequently take a more independent and even antagonistic stance toward the public and private sectors. It is true that Salamon's theory emphasizes the economic logic behind nonprofit creation, but it seems unenlightening if not unfair to discredit it on the basis of what may well be a limited number of exceptions that are the focus of this text.

There are many inadequacies in most of the subsequent chapters, which for the most part focus on a particular community or type of nonprofit organization or both. A common foible is that the cases tend to underplay severely potential concerns about method. Beyond a brief article based on a limited survey of nonprofit directors, the essays are only loosely anchored in any kind or rigorous approach to data collection and analysis. Contributors Joseph Cordes, Jeffrey Henig, and Eric Twombly, for example, make the rather bold assertion that increasing “privatization” of nonprofits may risk “further depletion of the role of purposive mission,” converting them into “more material-based organizations” (p. 59). Yet, they offer only anecdotal examples of this sort of conversion, which leads me to wonder whether and to what extent it is really occurring.

Todd Swanstrom and Julia Koschinsky argue that community-based housing organizations (CBOs) have the primary goal of “addressing place-based inequalities … that limit the ability of citizens to realize their full potential as active economic, social, and political beings” (p. 75). They find that contemporary CBOs are instead emphasizing “service delivery and real estate development” (p. 85). Once again, however, the evidence is at best sketchy, and the reader cannot judge the validity of the authors' analysis, including the extent to which CBOs actually embrace the authors' notions about their goals. One does not expect definitive data in a volume of essentially case studies, but the contributors collectively ignore such concerns.

Several articles freely substitute normative assertions for more objective analysis. A common undercurrent is the idea that nonprofit organizations should be vehicles of political change, rather than merely alternate modes for urban service delivery. Several authors suggest (as do Swanstrom and Koschinsky) that cutbacks in public funding have forced nonprofits to “sell out.” If that is indeed the case, they need to consider to what extent, if any, the clients of these organizations would be better served by more focus on political expression and less on the delivery of tangible goods and services.

Some of the articles seem to be too sanguine about the effect of political efforts by nonprofits. In their essay, editors Hula and Jackson-Elmoore describe the development of “governing nonprofits” in Detroit. These are defined as nonprofits for which “targeted empowerment” of otherwise disenfranchised or alienated groups is a “core organizational goal” (p. 130). They strongly suggests that such groups have succeeded in increasing the representation of African Americans and, therefore, the city's “civic capacity” to address social and economic issues. They fail to consider that this development occurred during a period when Detroit lost a significant portion of its white population to suburban areas, which made increased minority representation almost inevitable, and they do not demonstrate that African Americans are now any better off than they would have been absent these organizations. Similarly, Marion Orr extols the “crucial role” of Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development (BUILD), citing a few limited accomplishments, such as the city's support for a “living wage” that was essentially ignored by corporate employers. I wonder whether and to what extent the political presence of BUILD is actually improving the lives of poorer residents.

In sum, Nonprofits in Urban America is an often provocative but equally disappointing foray into the political aspects of American nonprofits. Too frequently, potentially significant questions are posed (or implied) but left unanswered or are answered with inadequate documentation. Nevertheless, the volume offers a useful descriptive survey of the range of political dimension of nonprofit organizations, particularly for those unfamiliar with this terrain.